Faced with an increasingly difficult challenge in growing both average revenue per user (ARPU) and numbers of subscribers, wireless carriers are trying to develop a host of new products, services, and business models based on data services. One such service is location services, which provide information specific to a location including actual locations of a user. It is expected that location based services will generate additional business for the carrier, from both the mobile user and content providers.
For the mobile user as well as the service provider, location-based services offer many opportunities. For example, location-based services can increase revenue of the service provider, e.g., network carrier, while improving services to end users, e.g., mobile users. Some examples of location-based services that can be provided to the mobile user include:                Providing the nearest business or service, such as an ATM or restaurant;        Providing alerts, such as notification of a sale on gas or warning of a traffic jam;        Providing weather reports which are germane to the location where the user is using the mobile device, etc.An advantage of using location services is that the mobile user does not have to manually specify ZIP codes or other location identifiers to use location-based services.        
For the network carrier, location-based services provide value add by enabling services such as:                Resource tracking with dynamic distribution (e.g., taxis, service people, rental equipment, doctors, fleet scheduling, etc.);        Finding people or information for the user (e.g., person by skill (doctor), business directory, navigation, weather, traffic, room schedules, stolen phone, emergency 911);        Proximity-based notification (push or pull) (e.g., targeted advertising, buddy list, common profile matching (dating), automatic airport check-in);        Proximity-based actuation (push or pull) (e.g., payment based upon proximity (EZ pass, toll watch).        
In addition, location based services (LBS) are convenient for sharing location data between wireless devices to wireless devices and from wireless devices to stationary devices like a home computer or stationary tracking system or content provider, etc. This would allow a third party to determine an exact location of a mobile user such as, for example, a family member, friend, employee, etc.
Two methods are commonly in use to determine the location of a wireless device with a third method starting to become more popular. These methods include signal strength of cell towers that are near the wireless device (e.g., triangulation); GPS triangulation; and exposing the LBS as a web service.
The first method determines a wireless device's location by comparing the signal strength of cell towers that are near the wireless device. This method is called triangulation and is substantially the same method that GPS devices use to determine their location. The difference between cell triangulation and GPS triangulation, though, is the signals they use to determine location. The second method, GPS triangulation, uses satellites to determine a device location. In either case, the latitude and longitude are kept in the location services infrastructure.
Another method includes creating location based services by exposing the LBS as a web service. For example, when a device wants an update from the location based system, it sends a request with the proper authentication credentials and a unique identifier that describes the device that is being tracked. The LBS returns the coordinates of the device being queried.
One of many issues facing the actual commercial deployment of location based services is privacy of the mobile user. These issues imply that significant work still needs to be done around the whole area of location privacy. For example, the following issues arise with privacy:                Determining location data associated with a target device and allowing external entities to access this information requires that the target device (or owner of that device) actually is aware of such access and has indicated so both implicitly and explicitly;        A general purpose authorization model that is easy to implement and widely accepted has still not been “rolled out” by many wireless service providers; and        Regulatory requirements require that exceptions be built into the infrastructure. For example location fixes for purposes of locating an emergency caller via the 911 infrastructure needs to be able to locate the caller regardless of their actual preferences.        
Accordingly, there exists a need in the art to overcome the deficiencies and limitations described hereinabove.